Existential Punk

The Fall Of Society

There are those in this world, especially right here in the USA, that want to place blame on socialism, abortion and gay marriage/rights, et al as the fall of society and reasons as to why tragedy hits places like Haiti. Socialism, communism, and capitalism are not evil in and of themselves. PEOPLE, we live in a human-filled, greed-filled world where sinful systems like greedy banks, consumerism and scare tactics like those of the GOP and Christian Right use to beat people into false submissions and manipulate them for votes and money. The greedy people who run these systems are sinful. When money becomes way more important than the well-being of others we have a huge problem. We do not live in a vacuum!

Any place that has socialism and gay marriage/rights has not fallen off the face of the earth. Europe has been thriving for years on Socialism. After living in the UK for two years and experiencing socialized medicine, i think they have a pretty good thing going on over there! i am so sick of the GOP calling Obama a socialist. What do they think Medicare and Medicaid and public schools are anyways? They are a form of socialism and we have not fallen off the face of the earth either. It's simply a way to cry wolf, keep control and manipulate what they want. It reminds me of '1984' when the government always kept rumours of war being broadcast. 

The countries that have gay marriage/rights seem to be doing just fine! No one has infected anyone with their queerness and yet heterosexual divorce is continually on the rise as well as marital infidelities!

Tragedies hit places like Haiti for several of reasons. One, we live in a natural world where natural disasters just take place. Two, we don't take care of the earth as we should so our humanity takes its toll on the earth's resources and pushes it to its limits. Third, corrupt governments use greed to further their own agendas rather than looking out for their own people and building sustainable societies with first world resources. Poverty and greed seem to be strange bedfellows that often go hand in hand.

The fall of society will come from these sinful societal entities if it is going to fall. These sinful systems have been around for thousands of years and society has yet to fall. So, i see the GOP and Christian Right throwing out red herrings and a straw man argument.i really do not believe that society will fall but the earth may one day give out and take it's last breath. What then, are we to do?

Rain Soaked

Rain Soaked

by Adele Sakler

for a long time, as

each year of my life has passed, i have

assimilated fear and

rejection of myself, acting as an

outcast.

fearful of failure but

wishing i could express the

rain soaked, raw emotions

inside my

timid being,

not knowing how to let

go and just write.

Copyright 2010. All Rights Reserved.

Uninvited Visitor

Uninvited Visitor

by Adele Sakler

My heart rages...

My heart rages on and on.

Why do you haunt me with such deep-seated pain?

You not only haunt my heart but my dreams while i slumber.

You egotistical sum bitch, i hate you.

Sum bitch, you uninvited visitor.

i wish you to be a stranger in a strange land,

far away from me,

far away from me!

Copyright 2010 All Rights Reserved

Adele & Peter: Queer & Christian: Conversation 7

Peter says, 'Here, Adele shares more of her painful experiences with ex-gay ministries, how she attended Pat Robertson's Regent University (TRULY!), and how these experiences nearly led her to suicide...'

In the next segment, i ask PETER a few questions! So, STAY TUNED! Adele

Adele & Peter: Queer & Christian: Conversation 5: 'Claiming To Know Christ...So Unloving...'

Peter says this, 'In this 5th segment of my interview with Adele, she makes some especially poignant remarks that I think you'll appreciate.

When the online attacks from fundamentalist bloggers were at their peak on www.Queermergent.com, Adele thought:

“If I weren’t already Christian, I wouldn’t want to be Christian…

“Who are these people who claim to know Christ and love Christ, but they are so unloving and unkind and ungenerous.'

 

'i Don't Get It'

A brutally honest comment from Lynn over at nakedpastor really resonated with me and her words are things i have expressed inside my mind and out loud before. In light of my recent posts where i have been wrestling with existential issues of the existence of G-D, i asked her permission to post her comment here as a reflection.

'The relationship with God that I attempted never felt very real. He never talked to me. I talked to him, but he was always silent. I had to just trust that he was really there and really listening.

I found what he said in the Bible very confusing and contradictory. It made me crazy trying to figure out which verses applied to which situations. Other people never seemed to have a problem with that. God never helped me to understand.

I finally gave up and decided this whole relationship was an imaginary thing inside my own head.

Aren’t there bare minimum standards for something to be considered a “relationship?”
What are those standards?

I also heard that in Islam, they are not trying to have a relationship with Allah. They revere him and submit, have certain duties, etc., but it’s not a warm and fuzzy thing like in Christianity. Hopefully I’m not misrepresenting anything here. I’m sure you see what I’m trying to get at.

Oh yeah, and would you want to have a relationship with someone you fear? Like they might throw you in hell if you’re not of the elect?

And God TELLS us to love him. Can you love someone just because they tell you to?

I don’t get it.'

What do you think? Have you wondered these same things but maybe you never expressed them aloud? Or, maybe you did ask them outside your own head? Do raw and honest expressions resonate with you or scare the shit out of you? If it scares you, why? - Existential Punk

How Dare i!

My dear friend, Peter Walker, posted a poem entitled, 'A Prayer Of Anger', by John Shea that i found to be totally raw, honest and scathing. i resonated with it because of my own struggles with my Lyme Disease and wrestling with all my existential angst as to the seemingly random things that happen in life and wondering where G-D is at in all of this. Is G-D present and involved? Does G-D exist in the midst of all this chaos of life? If so, why do bad things happen? Theodicy, which is the vindication of divine goodness and providence in view of the existence of evil, and it's attempt to answer the problem of evil in the world are topics that have long been discussed and we never seem to get to the bottom of anything. Answers become dogmatic, circular, black and white, inconclusive, boring, old, worn out, shitty, et al. At times i am ok with not having everything neatly tied up and every question answered. Mystery makes for an interesting life. YET, if i am honest with myself, i do want some fucking answers and not having the answers frustrates the snot out of me! i get pissed off, frustrated, enraged, confused, indignant, snappy, defensive, and feeling totally out of control.

Sometimes i just hate life - how i react to people, how other people treat one another with contempt or in inhumane ways, the burdens of the world with all the poor, the human trafficking, corruption, wars, famines, global warming - HELL - FUCKING HUMANITY just plain grates on my nerves!! i grate on my own nerves!! G-D, if G-D does indeed exist, GRATES ON MY NERVES AS WELL! i recognize that i am human, i am depraved, i am failing, i am insecure, i am selfish, i am an asshole, i am deceived at times, i am often wrong, i am arrogant, i am bitchy, i am impatient, i am out of control, i am hateful in many ways, i am decidedly ungenerous to those who are unkind to me.

Is there really a G-D to extend grace and mercy to me or am i to simply rely on the kindness that humans can extol at times? G-D, oh G-D, IF YOU are real and exist in our lives, why do i often find myself having such a difficult time recognizing you? i have struggled with all these things the entirety of my nearly 22 year odyssey with you. i keep hanging on because something i cannot explain draws me, drives me, propels me. Some will say it's blindness and deception due to my being queer. Maybe that's true, but i don't believe so. i think it's a natural part of being human and honest.

That's the problem i see in many churches today and with some of those that i have been a part of in the past. People are so busy running around doing and not taking the time to examine their own lives. The busyness takes the place of honest reflection. Honest reflection and examination is where i believe true transformation takes place. It's important to serve others, but if we don't ever take time to get ourselves in order, then how can we truly be effective in helping others and treating others with the love and kindness that G-D commands of us rather than with contempt or an agenda. Sometimes i just feel stuck and become overwhelmed and paralyzed. Then i end up not accomplishing anything. At times i know this is ok too. It's just the ebb and flow of life.

i feel like lately when i pray it's just gibberish i'm saying and not sure really how to pray when i feel like G-D is so random in how G-D chooses to allow or not allow things to happen. Why did G-D set us up to fail so G-D could so gallantly come to redeem us yet still allow all this fucking shit to happen. Life is hard and there is no magic solution but i desire to see more of G-D at work in our midst. i even wonder if i am a deist, where G-D just created us and then left us to figure everything out because i feel like i am reaching so often in the dark and not knowing what i am reaching for if that makes sense.  i have come to the conclusion that at this point i am a Christian Agnostic because i simply cannot sign on the dotted line anymore at this point and ascribe to all the human created doctrines and long-held man-made traditions of Christendom any longer. i know that i am ranting here but this has been inside me for so long that i felt like a tick filled with blood ready to explode all over the place. i am just writing what is deep inside me. i don't claim to have any answers nor do i expect anyone else to either. There just may simply be no answers. i must come to a place of acceptance of that possible reality and i fight it because i hate and loathe it so much. 

i have rambled A LOT and many of my thoughts may not make sense to you. That's ok because i often write for my own processing, but if something does resonate with you, the reader, then that is awesome. If it angers or worries some, i am sorry, but this is my space to be open and honest with what i am processing in my life. i just needed to vent as this has been a long-time coming and i'm sure more will come.

i so deeply resonated with Shea's poem. Thanks so much, Peter, for sharing this on your blog. Here's the raw and honest poem:

A PRAYER OF ANGER

No hymn of praise today.
No hand-clapping alleluia

For the All-Good God
And his marvelous handiwork.
Lord
A child has been born bad.
He gangles and twitches and shames
The undiscovered galaxies of your creation.
Why could not the hands
that strung the stars
Dip into that womb to bless and heal?
Please no voice from Job's Whirlwind
Saying how dare I. I dare!
Yet I know no answer comes
Save that tears dry up, skin knits,
And humans love broken things.
But to you who are always making pacts
You have my word on this -
On the final day of fire
After You have stripped me
(if there is breath left)
I will subpoena You to the stand
In the court of human pain.

John Shea

So, what do you, the reader, think about all this? i don't look for preaching and answers, just honest conversation. Thanks to my readers for taking the time to read, process and journey with me on this odyssey of life. - Existential Punk